Desperados Waiting for a Train

By
Glenn W. Smith
– August 10, 2010Posted in: Culture, Economy, Featured, Music, Politics

Oh my mama told me
‘Cause she say she learned the hard way
She say she wanna spare the children
She say don’t give or sell your soul away
‘Cause all that you have is your soul

So don’t be tempted by the shiny apple
Don’t you eat of a bitter fruit
Hunger only for a taste of justice
Hunger only for a world of truth
‘Cause all that you have is your soul.

The sentiment above, expressed beautifully by singer-songwriter Tracy Chapman, goes to the heart of Americans’ self-image. In this nation, we tell ourselves, we are free to be true to our souls. I guess it all depends upon what you mean by “true” or “soul.”

Like the narrator’s mother in the song, we seem condemned to learn this truth the hard way, if we learn it at all. If the financial meltdown has not taught us anything else, it should teach us that there’s hell to pay when you sell your soul.

Jean Paul Sartre famously described hell as other people. I think, instead, that our soul is other people. Living within a Ayn Randian/Social Darwinist myth of the isolated individual versus the world, we exploit others for our own advantage. It’s our own souls that pay the price. By the way, Sartre always claimed he was misunderstood. He said:

It simply brings out the capital importance of all other people for each one of us.

I meet people from all walks of life and from all parts of the country who live as if they recognize this simple truth. Our everyday interactions with friends and strangers depend upon it. We give honest change at the bar. We hold doors open for the elderly and the frail (in the South, men still hold them open for women).

Collectively, though, we live by a dim and different light. Others are our competitors in a zero sum game. It’s insane, really. The devilish rich think they can run off with all the money. They shrug off 10 percent unemployment and all the suffering it causes, knowing all the while that it’s caused by their actions. They can’t run away with the money, though, ‘cause there’s nowhere for them to run. That’s Tracy Chapman’s lesson of the bitter fruit. Sartre’s, too.

In his song about a young boy’s friendship with an old oilfield roughneck, Guy Clark sings that they we’re “desperados waiting for a train.” He was on to something there. We live in the Land of the Pinkertons, and it often seems like love and friendship so threaten the Randians among them that those of us looking for a little kindness, love and justice are, of necessity, desperados.

The beautiful thing about Clark’s song is its unpretentious, down-home prairie humanism. The magic of life is in our relationship with others, especially others who never gave up on their souls, fortifying our own. People like the roughneck, who, Clark tells us, was “an old school man of the world” and a “hero of this country.”

The clip above is from an old Letterman broadcast. Singing with Nanci Griffith are Clark, Jimmie Dale Gilmore, Rodney Crowell, Eric Taylor, Jerry Jeff Walker and the inimitable Steve Earle. I’ve been privileged to meet most of this gang. Some of ‘em I know pretty well. We ought to elect them all to Congress.

Hungering only for a taste of justice, only for a world of truth, one day we’re gonna elbow one another and say about the train we’ve been waiting on, “Come on Jack that son-of-a-bitch is coming.”

Related Articles:

  • No Related Related

About Glenn W. Smith

Glenn W. Smith has spent the past 30 years in journalism and politics, where he’s made a name for himself as a writer, campaign manager, activist, think tank analyst and, as Daily Kos founder Markos Moulitsas says, a “legendary political consultant and all-around good guy.” “There’s no one like him,” says author George Lakoff. CNN commentator Paul Begala says, “He has unmatched experience, a graceful pen (or pixel nowadays) and deep insight into the best and worst of us.” Novelist Sarah Bird speaks of his “lucid and lyrical” prose. And, she says, he’s fun. Huffington Post founder Arianna Huffington says Glenn writes with “grace and abundant humor” and “uses his colorful experiences in Texas to enlighten us all.”

Smith led Ann Richards’ successful 1990 campaign for Governor of Texas. He worked for former Texas Lt. Gov. Bill Hobby and U.S. Senator Lloyd Bentsen. Earlier, Smith was a political reporter for the Houston Chronicle and the Houston Post. He’s coordinated national campaigns for groups such as MoveOn.org. In 2004, he authored the highly acclaimed book, The Politics of Deceit: Saving Freedom and Democracy from Extinction. He also wrote Unfit Commander, a book that detailed George W. Bush’s mysterious disappearance from military service.

In 2004, Smith was featured in the film, Bush’s Brain, a documentary about Karl Rove. Smith provided commentary on Rove’s role as then-President Bush’s senior advisor. He has made numerous media appearances with Chris Mathews on Hardball, Joe Scarborough, Brit Hume, and many others. He writes a regularly for top national web sites, including FireDogLake and Huffington Post.

As a senior fellow at George Lakoff’s prestigious Rockridge Institute in Berkeley he studied, wrote and taught on the power of metaphor and narrative in political communications. He also lectured on religion and politics at the Starr King School for Ministry in Berkeley. As a sponsor and organizer, he has pulled together numerous national events with progressive religious leaders. He also organized a celebration of Dr. Martin Luther King at Riverside Church in New York City as well as “Freedom and Faith” bus tours, which was a nationwide campaign for social justice and progressive values.

Smith’s play, Double Play, which explored American Western myths and legends, was held over to sold-out audiences. He’s even written and performed songs in the Americana tradition, such as his best-known song, “Helping Marty Robbins,” a tribute to his hometown, Houston.

Most recently, Smith is the creator of DogCanyon, a political and cultural web site covering state, national and global issues from a Texas perspective. DogCanyon is an exhilarating and unique site that gets the connections between politics and culture and explores both the personal side of politics and the ups, down, craziness and beauty of “life its ownself,” as humorist Dan Jenkins would say. DogCanyon offers heartfelt personal essays, hard-hitting political analysis, and, most importantly, laughs.

As Paul Begala said, Smith writes in “the finest, firmest, fearless tradition of Texas essayists like Molly Ivins.”